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freezer or Refrigerator ?

bornredi

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I would like to make eather a freezer or a refrigerator into A place to do my  fermentation. Which would be better to use with a temp. controller. Or is there better ways to do it. I live in south louisiana and I want to control my temps for fermentation.
 
I like a fridge because of humidity control.
I do use an old (free) upright freezer for my fermentation though (The fridge is my 6 tap kegerator)

With either you will need an external temp controller.  Both will work just fine.

Fred
 
Passload said:
If you plan on brewing some lagers a freezer will work the best. IMHO. ;D


  I have one freezer and am thinking about getting a second. Get the biggest one you can.
  Also a lot of upright feezers have the freezing units in the shelves and they are not adjustable.
 
I would have to agree with the majority here - if you intend to lager go for a freezer as they generally offer space for multiple fermenters.  It is very difficult to put more than one in a conventional refrigerator.

Cheers!
Brad
 
Hmmm.  Have to work on the wife for this one.  Hey hon, can you move the bacon and pork roast out of the way, I need to get my fermenter in here!  Nah, that's not gonna' work.  Guess I'll have to buy her a new one because I love her so much  ;D
 
Hey, it's how I got my beer fridge in the garage.  She complained slightly about not having enough room in the old fridge, so I bought a new one and they were going to charge me $25 to haul the old one away.  But it still worked, so I told them to take it to the garage and I'd take care of it.  And I did.  Cleaned it out, took out the crispers on the bottom, set the shelves at the appropriate beer bottle levels and I now have enough room for 3 mini-kegs and quite a few cases of beer without having to put any in the main fridge.  The wife's happy with the new one, I'm happy with the old...win-win.

Now if I can just convince her on the freezer..... ::)
 
Chest freezers are good for the capacity, as noted.  Also, lids (on top) retain the cold air inside much better than doors (in front).  Each time you open a fridge's doors a lot of cold air falls out.  That might be an even bigger issue in southern LA in the long summers. 

Either way, those nylon brew-haulers for carboys make moving and lifting much easier and safer.
 
Another benefit of chest freezers is the selection.  You can find them anywhere from about 5 cubic feet up to 25+ to accommodate your your area.  They also double as beer cellar!  I found mine on Craigslist for $40 bucks.

cheers
 
I use freezers because in my experience they offer more useable room.  Freezers can also hit lower temperatures that are useful for lagering.  I also think that I get better temperature control as most refrigerators are refrigerator/freezers making temperature control of the refrigerator section difficult.  As long as you are fermenting in carboys or buckets, chest freezers work well and would be my recommendation.  I use a 13.7 cf frost free upright freezer because my conical fermenter is too tall to fit in my chest freezer and the upright allows easy access to the valves at the bottom of the fermenter.
 
For me, I'd go with freezer in case you want to do lagers. I think it would be hard to get a standard fridge down to near freezing. Good luck!
 
I ferment in a large side-by-side refrigerator (I can fit 4 corney kegs in the refrigerator section) and have not had any issues with not getting cold enough - my czech pilsner is currently lagering at a brisk 34 deg F. I have an external temp. control controlling the temp inside the fridge.
 
OK big chest freezers look like the optimum solution.
But what about temperature control.
The basic freezer thermostat surely is too inaccurate with too wide a band of controlled temperature.
And it's likely on it's last legs.
Have you guys found a modest cost solution or do you just forget it a set to the lowest temperature.
 
Most people use something like this:
http://www.kegworks.com/product.php?productid=18114&source=base
This is the one I use:
http://www.austinhomebrew.com/product_info.php?products_id=10122

Cheers
Preston
 
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